Thursday, September 23, 2010

Holdren Back in the News

John Holdren, chief science advisor to President Obama, is making news again on the subject of geoengineering. Earlier this month, Holdren delivered a presentation titled "Climate-Change Science and Policy: What Do We Know? What Should We Do?" at a scientific conference held in Oslo. Among his list of "conceivable mitigation policies" was geoengineering. While this mention was peripheral in the context of his overall remarks, it is interesting that Holdren would raise the issue at all after the ruckus he caused last year. Regardless, this is unlikely to signal any greater openness to geoengineering on the part of the Administration.

(For those unfamiliar with the story, Holdren said of geoengineering in a 2009 interview, "It's got to be looked at. We don't have the luxury of taking any approach off the table." This caused some commotion and resulted in Holdren clarifying that these were only his "personal views.")